Mandriva releases "unofficial" XFCE edition of Mandriva 2008 Spring

As a side note, I have Mandriva 2008 Spring installed on three systems and use XFCE on all of them, I installed GNOME first, then installed XFCE afterwards. As one of the systems is a 10-year old Pentium (1) system, I had been looking for something lightweight to use on it, because of the slow CPU (by today's standards). XFCE runs beautifully on the Pentium.

I wish I had discovered XFCE previously, as I would definitely have begun to use it sooner rather than now. ;D

With a legacy laptop PIII-866MHz , 256MB RAM ,20GB HD I can run the Live CD of mandriva-linux-one-2008-spring-xfce4-int-cdrom-i586.iso.The desktop is perfect for this 7 years old machine and runs nicely.

I now wish to install the distro on the HD. However I can't find a way to do just that . There is only 1 option on the welcome screen (running the live CD) The options under the F3 key I don't understand...........I am a semi-newbie

Would appreciate if someone could give some advice how to permanently install the distro with xfce4 on the HD.

With a legacy laptop PIII-866MHz , 256MB RAM ,20GB HD I can run the Live CD of mandriva-linux-one-2008-spring-xfce4-int-cdrom-i586.iso.The desktop is perfect for this 7 years old machine and runs nicely.

I'm glad to hear that.

gm0csz wrote:

I now wish to install the distro on the HD. However I can't find a way to do just that . There is only 1 option on the welcome screen (running the live CD) The options under the F3 key I don't understand...........I am a semi-newbie

Can you explain what you call the option under the F3 key?

gm0csz wrote:

Would appreciate if someone could give some advice how to permanently install the distro with xfce4 on the HD.

Once In Live mode, the installation Menu is in the Mandriva Menu > Parameters > Live Install

At almost the end you are asked to allow Gnome as desktop ,if you just carry on , you won't get a desktop upon reboot.,so.....allow Gnome !

Total boot time from start to ready desktop 2 minutes (using the above machine)

After selecting a mirror for a repository you can download kernel elements including a number related to xfce.

Verdict :Excellent distro version for a legacy PC enabling new users to taste (and ,no doubt,,get hooked to) Linux using equipment up to 10 yrs old .

Recommendation : To facilitate using the iso CD for a Live Install on a Hard Drive ,developers could have a look at the Xubuntu Live CD , where the start screen shows 2 run options :------ Run system without changing your computer

------ Installation on a Hard Drive

Thanks for an excellent Mandriva 2008.1 distro version. With some initial guidance it would be an very good start voor people who never have used a computer before.Linux has landed ...........for PC newbies !